Muhammad Sani Abdullahi is the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Amsaj Industrial Company Limited. The company is the sole distributor of liquid gel fertilizer in West, East and Central Africa. In this interview with AWAAL GATA, Abdullahi explains the potency of the fertilizer and how it could revolutionize farming in Nigeria
What is Amsaj into?
We are into agricultural imports. We also buy agric commodities to help farmers sell in bigger markets. Also, we represent one of the leading agric companies in the world in most part of Africa. The company is based in Spain, and Amsaj is its representative in West Africa, East Africa and Central Africa. The company manufactures liquid gel fertilizer in an inorganic form. The fertilizer was first introduced in Nigeria in 2013.
How is the fertilizer different from others?
You know barriers are always broken in the contemporary world. If you go to Europe, unlike what we do in Nigeria, people wouldn’t be seen manually applying fertilizer on their crops. It is not possible at all there because you can see a farm covering more than five kilometers; what they now do is foliar application, which is better, which enhances more yield. It is better because they seep into the crops immediately, unlike the solid fertilizer, which has to wait for rain to work, and if it is irrigation the land has to be irrigated before it works. There are many liquid fertilizers, but we have the only liquid gel in inorganic in the whole of Nigeria and other parts of West Africa. There could be other liquid fertilizers, but ours is in form of inorganic gel; that is why if a farmer applies a litre of it, it is equivalent to four to five bags of the normal fertilizers you know.
So far, how have Nigerian farmer accepted it?
What we did when we brought the liquid gel fertilizer into Nigeria was that we took it to the Federal Ministry of Agriculture for trial and for them to help us confirm its potency. The ministry’s fertilizer department then took it to A.B.U., Zaria’s Soil and Science Department and to University of Ibadan for a test, and they graded us excellently. After that we took it to NAFDAC for them to tell us whether it has side effects on foods or not, and they said it has no any. According to the report, if you are using our product you could get 300 percent increment in your yield. Secondly, the product can be used for any crop without any side effect.
What is the cost of the fertilizer?
For example, if you are spending N100 thousand on your farm in terms of fertilizer yearly, if you switch to our product, you will spend only N20 thousand; and you will get 62 percent increment in your yield. Again, people have to know that our product doesn’t wait for rain before seeping into the crops. It is ultimately the farming remedy in this age of short rainfalls, because just with the morning dew, they work and aid crops to germinate perfectly. Other fertilizers, after application, wait for rain to work, our own only needs dews to work, and you know dews must come every morning, no matter what. With our fertilizer, as well, crops can still survive even when the temperature is 60 degree Celsius.
Has the product reached everywhere in Nigeria?
Yes, we are almost everywhere in the country; we started with Katsina state, because we brought in 10 thousand litres for demonstration free of charge. Katsina was followed by Bida, in Niger state, then Jigawa, Kaduna, Gomba, Plateau, Adamawa, Edo, among others. The product is in the market now, selling. It was used in the last irrigation farming season and the ongoing rainy season. And all the farmers that came in contact with it testified to all that I have been telling you. We have NPK, Urea, Nitrogen with micro elements, Borom, Zinc complex and amino silver. We are present in over 74 countries across the world, and many of the countries you see thriving because of agriculture highly owe their successes to our product.
When did your relationship with agriculture started?
I have been in the agric field since 1986. I started with buying and exporting of hide and skin, cotton, gum Arabic, sesame seed, cashew-nuts and groundnut.
Do you have a farm?
I do, but my businesses don’t afford me the time to work on it; so I just help farmers to do well as they work on their farms. We also help them in marketing their farm produce. Yes, it the responsibility of the government to do that, but the load has been too much on them, hence people like me are coming in, and that is why we need the support of the government to make a headway for us.
You want to partner with the government to improve agriculture in Nigeria?
Exactly, and I am talking about government at all levels. We also are not leaving farmers’ organizations out. We alone with the government cannot do it; we need to carry the farmers along on how to farm up till how they are going to markets their harvests.
So far, I will say they are trying their best. Also, as far as this current administration is concerned, their major concern is agriculture and mining, which is very good. If they government don’t get distracted along the way, am assuring you that the plans it has in terms of agriculture alone can change the fortunes of this country. We are praying for the government that the security problem in which the country is facing come to an end soon, with this foliar application, the youth, within a year, if the government gives us support; three million jobs for youth can be created, and the unemployment that is prevalent in the country will definitely come to an end.
As far as I am concerned, the current administration is going to be the best, because it has the best of leaders. I also advise the youth to go into farming and mining. In the next few years, the use of solid fertilizer is going to drop by 60 to 70 percent, so Nigerian people and government should wake up as soon as possible.
